"A THREAT TO PUBLIC ORDER" - The question of the Strategic Offensive of the
World Proletarian Revolution. (PART TWO)
We are re-publishing the complete text of the
document "A Threat To Public Order" both to
satisfy several requests from friends in the
list, as well as to put the right perspective
on the question of the Strategic Offensive
of the World Revolution, the question of the
"Peace Agreement Plot" in Peru and other
subjects that are been bandied around in
the most ignorant, demagogic and superficial
fashion by certain bogus "maoist" sources
and phoney defenders of the People's War in Peru.
Committee Sol Peru
Press Commission
A. OLAECHEA
"A THREAT TO PUBLIC ORDER"
SPEECH FOR THE '2nd PERU HEARING'
IN BELGIUM (26/02/94) (CONTINUATION FROM PART 1)
THREE STAGES IN THE PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION
If we look at the history of the world proletarian revolution
we can in this last process also observe three distinct moments
or stages: strategic defensive, strategic equilibrium and
strategic offensive.
The period of strategic defensive culminated with the defeat
of fascist aggression and with its extremely important victory
in China the revolution entered fully into strategic equilibrium.
This historical development was aptly summed up by Chairman
Mao Tse-tung's famous phrase:'The East wind prevails over the
West wind'.
Although progress prevailed in strategic terms and in
historical perspective in this era there were still no
conditions for the proletarian forces to obliterate
the bourgeois imperialist world order.
But simultaneously, the old imperialist bourgeoisie was
also unable to smash the revolution.
Joseph Stalin wrote Economic Problems of Socialism
in 1952. In it he gave a crisp synthesis of the economic
and political background upon which the new moment
continued to develop and intensify:
"The basic economic law of modern capitalism - meaning
the capitalism of the monopolies and trusts, imperialism - can
be formulated roughly in this way: The securing of the maximum
capitalist profit through the exploitation, ruin and
impoverishment of most of the population of the given
country, through the enslavement and systematic robbery
of the peoples of other countries, especially backward
countries, and, lastly through wars and militarisation
of the national economy, which are used for the obtaining
of the highest profits".
In this framework we can observe advances for the world's
people, but also retrenchment of the bourgeoisie within
the imperialists countries. The appearance of modern
revisionism in the Soviet Union was the greatest feather
in their cap. Nevertheless, blow for blow, the class forces
of the proletariat disputed the bourgeoisie in every
arena within an strategic equilibrium.
In this context the Cultural Revolution in China was the
greatest blow dealt by the proletariat against the whole
basis of the bourgeois order. This historical event
spanned more than 10 years and involved hundreds of
millions of people in China and all over the world.
The Cultural Revolution thus initiated an assault along
the whole front upon the "capitalist heaven": the bourgeois
superstructure, the roots of the division of labour and
the kernel of the bourgeois ideological outlook.
=20
The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution did not take
place in a vacuum and was inscribed in the decade of
the sixties and seventies, a time when all the prevailing
ideological roots of the old order came under unprecedented
attack the world over.
Moreover, it was the most powerful response of the
proletariat to the modern revisionism of Khrushchev,
Liu Shao-shi and Deng Xiao Ping. Thus, after Chairman
Mao's death and when the enemies of the proletariat
usurped state power in China, a new moment within the
strategic equilibrium developed. On the one hand,
the proletariat and the peoples of the world continued
their struggles in various ways. On the other hand,
the bourgeoisie usurped state power over the
former socialist world.
GIGANTIC ANTI-MARXIST CAMPAIGN
An era of negation of proletarian leadership was
ushered in with the aim of obliterating the very
idea of continuing the revolution under the
leadership of the proletariat and even the final goal,
communism.
A general and unprecedented anti-Marxist offensive
spearheaded by imperialism and social-imperialism
was unleashed upon the achievements of the proletariat
and the peoples. A counter-revolutionary offensive
aimed primarily against revolutionary Marxism which
they proclaimed, in all their forums and by every
means at their disposal, to be dead and buried.
This reactionary offensive was again predicated
upon the old reformist tune: first, it was claimed
that the road of the proletariat was no longer to
overthrow the old imperialist order by means of
revolutionary violence. It was now to achieve a
peaceful transition.
Eventually the question of transition itself was
glossed over and the aim, communism, given up as
a hopeless ideal. The traitors unmasked themselves
and began promoting another form of transition: their
own transition to unbridled capitalism.
However, Stalin had already in 1952 referred to
these theories:
"It is said that the average profit might
nevertheless be regarded as quite sufficient
for capitalist development under modern conditions.
That is not true. The average profit is the lowest
point of profitability, below which capitalist
production becomes impossible. But it would be
absurd to think that, in seizing colonies, subjugating
peoples and engineering wars, the magnates of modern
monopoly capitalism are striving to secure only the
average profit. No, it is not the average profit,
nor yet superprofit - which as a rule, represents only
a slight addition to the average profit - but precisely
the maximum profit that is the motor of monopoly
capitalism. It is precisely the necessity of securing
the maximum profits that drives monopoly capitalism
to such risky undertakings as the enslavement and
systematic plunder of colonies and other backward
countries, the conversion of some independent countries
into dependent countries, the organisation of new wars
- which to the magnates of modern capitalism is
the "business" best adapted to the extraction of
the maximum profit - and, lastly, attempts to win
world economic domination".
Every defender of accommodation with the order of
exploitation has always advocated this thesis of a
moderate and reasonable capitalism so well
disposed of by Stalin. If today Gorbachev and
Yeltsin can show even a dubious merit, it is that
they have finally demonstrated, in a way that can no
longer be covered up with empty phrases and May Day
parades, what this actually means in practise for
the proletariat and the people.
Red flags have come down from the top of parliaments
and the Kremlin, from ministries and buildings, and
the international bourgeoisie has loudly proclaimed
that communism is dead. Does this mean that the
proletarian revolution has regressed and has been
forced back into the strategic defensive by capitalism,
as predicated today by the reactionary intellectuals?
Have we gone back into strategic defensive? Not at all.
We have, in fact, entered the era of strategic
offensive of the world proletarian revolution.
SOCIALISM LIVES IN THE PROLETARIAT AND THE PEOPLE
To those who believe that the overt revelation of
the restoration of capitalism in the former socialist
world is a defeat for the proletariat, we say: You are
hiding the fact that capitalism was restored from the
moment the bourgeoisie usurped power from the proletariat
and overturned its dictatorship. It should be sufficient
to consider how Lenin defined socialism to realise that
the fundamental question in socialism is the
dictatorship of the proletariat.
That for the class, besides power, everything else
is an illusion.
Using the form of a mathematical formula, Lenin once
expressed: "State Capitalism + Dictatorship of the
Proletariat =3D Socialism". Those who, calling themselves
Marxists, lament that the states controlled by
social-imperialism have revealed their true character,
forget that without the dictatorship of the proletariat
there is no socialism. That without this dictatorship
all that remains of Lenin's formula is but state capitalism.
These people do not even know the meaning of the
phrase, "cast away illusions, prepare for struggle".
The truth is that the bourgeoisie has only managed
to transfer the red flags from atop bureaucratic
buildings to the hands of the masses. What can be
wrong with that?. Were not the masses the ones who
with their own blood had put them there in the
first place? Cannot they, if they so want, place
them back wherever they like and do whatever it
takes for it to be so?
The truth is that the bourgeoisie is constructing
an immense bonfire with the dried tinder of their
misdeeds against people all over the world.
The imperialist order can neither extricate itself
>from crisis nor can it achieve the slightest degree
of stability and their problems are mounting daily.
It can still deal heavy blows but it cannot justify
its misrule in the slightest. When class forces
are reckoned the imperialists and the bourgeois
reactionaries of the world are but a tiny minority
pitted against the interests of the millions upon
millions of the masses.
And amid these countless millions there is a class
with a rich experience of political power and of
constructing a new order, more just and more humane
in every way. A class that has gained a new outlook
and is continuing to fight this tiny minority at
every turn and on a world scale.
This class is the proletariat, the legitimate leader
of the democratic forces of the world. Its true
strength lays there where it has always been, in
its consciousness, its organisation and its active
mobilisation to achieve its goals. For this class
state power, even within the most revolutionary state,
has value only as a tool to advance its aim, communism.
In truth, does not this aim precisely imply the
abolition of all forms of the state?.
Today the proletariat's qualitative and quantitative
strength is greater than ever in its history. The proletariat
is ready to accomplish its role as gravedigger of the dying
imperialist system and to build a new world.
This is the era of the strategic offensive of which
Chairman Mao spoke: The next 50 to 100 years in which,
amid the greatest epic of the class struggle, bourgeois
exploitation will be smashed and golden communism,
the undying goal of humanity, will arise.
An era in which "nations want independence
and people want liberation".
THE REVOLUTION IN STRATEGIC OFFENSIVE
Then in 1980 the People's War in Peru broke out,
marking the onset of this era of strategic offensive
of the world revolution. Again, and in the advanced
conditions described above, the communists, proletarians
and true democrats of the world can clearly see that
their class continues to aim for the seizure of power
under its own flags.
Also a third, new and superior stage, more intense
and more combat ready, of the ideology that has
historically impelled the proletariat towards victory,
arises as Maoism. Moreover, this ideology is validated
by the concrete experience of the revolutionary
advance in Peru. That is the central achievement to date
of the Peruvian revolution and, in particular, of Chairman Gonzalo.
This means that the class that is fighting against the old
rotting order of imperialism has again the necessary
leadership for smashing the imperialist chain in a part
of the world, the necessary leadership for achieving victory
and projecting its power and influence upon the world arena.
It means that by adopting revolutionary Marxism as its
indispensable outlook and guide and with the active
participation of all true communists, revolutionaries
and democrats, the world revolution may again defeat
the fascist offensive and renew its final assault upon
the ramparts of exploitation.
That such a beacon of hope for democratic peoples all
over the world summons us to final battle against an
unjust and intolerable order, that all this is happening
at a time when the whole world cries out for solutions
while the old society, unable to offer alternatives
collapses, that, more than anything else, is the
profoundest historical significance of the People's War
in Peru.
APPENDIX I
Ministry of Interior Affairs
Office des Etrangers
Square de Meeu=96s n=A7 8
Boit 5 1040=20
BRUXELLES - BELGIUM
Attention: Visa Section - Peru
Via fax: 010 322 5144 787
London March 15, 1994
Your Ref: CO4.98/2757
Dear Sirs,
I would like to appeal your refusal of an entry
visa and ask you to reconsider your decision.
This refusal was communicated to me on 09/03/94
by letter from your embassy in London.
I would like you to detail and explain the
reasons for refusal of visa, since I am protected
against such anti-democratic abuses both by
Convention law and Community law.
Your action against my freedom of movement,
rendering of services, (in this case the delivery
of a lecture at the invitation of a lawful Belgian
Organisation), freedom of thought, freedom of expression,
freedom of association are clear violations of the
European Convention of Human Rights (Articles 9 and 10).
The use of the 'Public Order' concept in order to deny
me the exercise of these rights is not compatible in law
with Rutili vs Minister of Interior (36/75 [1975] ECR 1219)
where it was concluded that the concept of 'public policy'
must be interpreted restrictively where it is used as a
justification for derogating from the principles of free
movement of workers and free movement of those
providing services.
I consider that the use of the term public order as a
reason for refusing me a visa constitutes a violation
of ECHR 9,10,11, Article 59 EC and Directive 73/148.
In Article 6, Directive 64/221 there is a requirement
for reasons to be given for refusal of entry on grounds
of public order. In this Article it is stated that
'public order' as a reason is insufficient.
Therefore, measures restricting movement taken on
the grounds of public policy have to be based exclusively
on the personal conduct of the individual concerned.
Moreover, and although this does not arise in my case,
you should note that even previous convictions of the
applicant should not 'in themselves' constitute grounds
for refusal of the right to free movement of workers
and services.
The Directive is extremely clear and stringent on the above.
You will note that as a spouse of a member state national,
and since I intended to travel to Belgium with my wife
who is herself a Dutch national - Community Directive of
21 May 1973 on the abolition of restrictions of movement
and residency within the community with regard to
establishment and provision of services (73/148/EEC,
Art. 1(c) - I am protected by the various freedoms
enshrined in European law.
You will also refer to Directives 64/221 and 73/148
for Community and Convention rights stipulating that
justifiable and explained reasons must be given for
refusing me a visa, and thus denying me my right of
free movement of workers and services.
Sincerely yours,
Adolfo Olaechea
10 b Homestead Road
London SW6 7DB.
Copies to: M. De Coninck, Attache Belgian Embassy
Jonathan Cooper, The Aire Centre, London
--- from list marxism at lists.village.virginia.edu ---